A Cold Night's Peace
by Kay Willow
Summary: Jade would say that he doesn't dislike places -- too irrational, anthropomorphizing a location -- but there's definitely that he was hoping to avoid Keterburg forever. Until Anise changed his mind for him. //future Jade/Anise//


**.a cold night's peace.**

Anise shivered dramatically, her arms wrapped tightly around herself, even though she was in a thick leather coat. "The snow is all really pretty, but I think I'm going to freeze and _die_ before we get to Nephry's," she complained. "Colonel~ Warm me up!"

"If you insist," Jade said, pleasantly, and flicked his fingers so that a tiny burst of fifth fonons lit the night air.

The young woman gave him a flat stare, perhaps not inclined to be set on fire. "Never mind. Honestly, it wouldn't kill you to be a little romantic."

"Oh, but it would," he argued. "I can feel myself threatening to come down with it already. It's quite unpleasant."

"That means you secretly _want_ to be romantic, but you're too much of a shut-in to know how," she declared. He sighed, recognizing that accusation, and they kept walking.

It had been, he thought, a dreadful idea to permit her to move to Grand Chokmah. She had seemed so forlorn when they elected the new Fon Master, muttering dark comments about having to wait until he kicked the bucket before she tried again, and so when Peony had suggested that she transfer to work for the embassy in his capital, Jade had reasoned that at the very least, she would be among friends, who would keep her from hatching dark plans in the night to bump off Fon Master Sylas.

Unfortunately, she had moved into _Jade's residence_ while he was out of town and taken root there, and she had immediately begun conspiring with _the one man who knew his weaknesses_ to make his life difficult. Guy and Peony had begun calling her "Jade's wife" and she had taken up the title with enthusiasm.

The story of how she had "convinced" him to come all the way out to Keterburg -- to visit his sister, her husband, and their (in all likelihood; Jade had never met them) sickeningly cute children -- was only a court ruling short of blackmail.

Anise murmured, "The cold must not bother you at all, huh? Since you grew up here."

"As you're well aware, I don't particularly notice the temperature."

He would have expected he to mutter about how cold he kept the Curtiss manor, but she was silent, looking up at the falling snow and the gray sky with her raucous unbound hair tumbling back from her face. She said finally, "But the only time you came back here in thirty years was for your sister's wedding. And Peony forced you to."

"Why, Anise, that's not true at all," Jade said, smiling. "First of all, I am only a sprightly forty-one, and I would have to be forty-_two_ in order for it to have been thirty years since I left Keterburg. And secondly, I came back here _several_ times a mere six years ago."

Anise folded her arms and glowered at him. "Yeah, because we had to in order to save the _world_. You never had a single dinner with her, or met anyone in her family, you just dropped by occasionally during _business hours_ with requests on behalf of the military."

It was irritating to be pressed on this issue; Jade was never one for explanations, and certainly not personal explanations about how his sister had been afraid of him since they were small children, how much she had tangled his best friend around her fingers and stolen that unconditional acceptance that Jade had relied on, deepening the inevitable strain with jealousy. There was a reason why he had avoided her since her marriage.

So he said nothing, and so Anise resumed her walking, sidling closer as she did to coil her arms through his, keeping him captive.

"You're such a baby," she said, squeezing his arm lightly. "Aren't you ever going to let go of those childhood wounds? I bet _she_ has."

"Big words, for someone a whole four months past her twentieth birthday," Jade said pleasantly. "How's Florian, by the way?"

Her elbow slammed into his side with painful force, surprising considering how her thick coat should have padded the blow. "Will you stop being a baby for _just one night_? Enjoy the pretty night, enjoy the snow, enjoy the company! Like I am."

"I thought you didn't like the cold," Jade pointed out. "It is responsible for the snow, you know. Shouldn't that mitigate your enjoyment of it?"

Anise sighed, and swayed into his side. She said, "And you're repsonsible for a lot of jackassery, but that doesn't mean I don't enjoy your company for some _mysterious reason_ anyway."

His lips curled up into a smile. "That's not a logically sound comparison, you know--" And then she was up on her tiptoes, an arm snaking around his neck, and kissing him.

The snow settled thickly on their hair and shoulders, and Nephry was waiting ahead, but for a minute, Jade allowed himself to just -- enjoy.


End file.
